Friday, October 17, 2014

As everyone already knows, New Zealand has won a term on the UN Security Council. I'm less than overjoyed by this. Why? For the simple reason that I do not trust our government to do the right thing in the position.

National has made it abundantly clear over its six years in office that its primary foreign policy goal is to crawl as far up America's arse as it possibly can. They've sent kiwi soldiers to Afghanistan to die in a pointless American war, and they're lining up to do the same for Iraq. They're fully committed to the Five Eyes mass-surveillance agenda, despite the UN finding that it violates international human rights law. They support American drone strikes, and American foot-dragging on climate change (something the US military thinks is an immediate threat to global security).

National will not change that goal simply because they have been elected to the UNSC, so rather than the independent voice the world voted for (and which they sold us as), they'll be getting an American patsy. The result will be bad for the world, and worse for our foreign policy. We've spent decades building that reputation for independence; its the only thing our mana-based foreign policy has. And National is going to piss it all away for some transitory international prestige and a chance to be a better boot-licker for their foreign masters. And we'll be paying for that betrayal for decades to come.